Brand Command: Mastering Brand Marketing On The Search Engines & Brand Protection Online “A Must-Read White Paper For Regional, National, And Global Brands�
Disclaimer: This document cites real, verifiable examples. There is no intent to harm or promote any of the brands presented. The examples are utilized to enhance your comprehension of the content.
Authored by Ayohwahr Interactive CEO, Tom Crandall “Welcome to our ‘USA Today’ version of Brand Command. It is designed to be an easy read and effectively illustrate a proven methodology for medium and large companies. I invite brand marketing practitioners and corporate leaders to contact me about the tactics and strategies herein, and how they may apply to your company.” -Tom Direct Line: (480) 570-9694
TABLE OF CONTENTS I.SEARCH FOR SUCCESS ...................................................................................................................3 II.WHAT IS BRAND COMMAND? ......................................................................................................3 III.BRAND PROTECTION ....................................................................................................................4 IV.SEO ...............................................................................................................................................11 V.PAID SEARCH (SEARCH ENGINE ADVERTISING) ......................................................................15 VI.ONLINE PR ...................................................................................................................................20 VII.LINK BUILDING ............................................................................................................................20 VIII.BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT TO BRAND LOYALTY .....................................................................22 IX.ANALYTICS ...................................................................................................................................25 X.INTEGRATING ONLINE MARKETING ...........................................................................................25 XI.JOIN US! .......................................................................................................................................29 XII.CONTACT US ..............................................................................................................................31
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I.
Search For Success Search has proven to be a vital communicative medium for many brands. Search features pull marketing versus push marketing—meaning people and organizations are looking for you, your products, your services, and your information. Are you really prepared? Search is how consumer and b2b prospects perform research and due diligence. Search is an unbeatable channel for business development, direct sales, and lead generation for many. Search is efficient, cost-effective, always available, and provides measurable ROI. Search also allows clients, customers, competitors, employees, and news media to dilute, defame, erode, or malign your brand. Search is responsible for 80% of all web traffic (Harris Interactive) Is your search marketing performance as effective as it could be?
II.
What is Brand Command? Brand Command is a methodology consisting of proven strategies for regional, national, and global brands. The tenets of Brand Command are to: 9 eliminate trademark infringement, copyright violations, and defamatory claims online 9 eliminate or mitigate negative or unwanted visibility online 9 dominate brand real estate in the search engines 9 master business development, direct sales, lead generation, and subscriptions with pull marketing content and programs 9 integrate offline campaigns and communications with expanded online engagement Page 3 of 31 email: brandcommand@ayohwahr.com | website: www.ayohwahr.com
III.
Brand Protection The evolution of the web now dictates that brands need to monitor brand visibility—you need eyes and ears online. Depending on the type of company, you may need to monitor your brand for up to six categories of visibility: •
Brand Abuse ~ trademark infringement, copyright violations, defamatory claims, competitors advertising on trademarks
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Brand Erosion ~ consumer complaints, customer service issues, disgruntled clients, unwanted visibility
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Brand Dilution ~ the weakening of a brand though its overuse in search engine advertisements
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Traffic Diversion ~ direct and indirect competitors advertising on your trademarks in the search engines
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Corporate Buzz ~ company news, executive visibility
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Non-compliance ~ illegal affiliate (distributor, reseller, partner, vendor) claims or guarantees
Brand Abuse Brand Abuse is a serious issue online and must be addressed by corporate leaders with a fiduciary responsibility to the company, in order to protect the brand and ensure future growth. Brand Abuse includes illegal actions such as trademark infringement in all forms (words, symbols, scents, devices, etc), copyright violations, competitors advertising on trademarks, as well as defamatory or malicious claims made against your brand. Brand Abuse runs rampant, and today, many large enterprises have several instances of Brand Abuse that their leadership is unaware of. In the Brand Abuse example below, we take a look at Allstate Insurance by searching Google with the keyword “Allstate.” The third result is a website entitled, “Allstate Insurance Sucks.” Not only is the copy destructive to the brand and highly visible, but the domain for this site is www.allstateinsurancesucks.com, which may be ruled as trademark infringement. See Diageo PLC (Guinness Beer) v. John Zuccarini. In a similar case, Taubman v. Webfeats, a Circuit court held that defendant’s registration of gripe sites incorporating plaintiff’s Page 4 of 31 email: brandcommand@ayohwahr.com | website: www.ayohwahr.com
trademarks into the domain names was protected by “Fair Use” of a trademark and the First Amendment. Companies face a difficult battle when attempting to take down “complaint” sites online where disgruntled customers and employees publish their grievances publicly. If the “complaint” site is engaged in commercial activity, federal trademark infringement, dilution and trade libel laws will protect a company against disparaging use of corporate names and trademarks. When the purpose of the disparagement is solely complaint or parody, these laws provide far less protection. In addition to legal actions, brands should utilize other strategies as well. What is the solution? Our Brand Command methodology dictates that brands need to dominate Brand Real Estate in both natural and the paid results of search engines, described later in this white paper. There isn’t much a company can do if another party uses their trademark in a sub-domain or sub-folder see Interactive Products Corporation v. a2z Mobile Office Solutions, Inc. Note: Allstateinsurancesucks.com runs ads on their “customer complaint” site, thereby leveraging the Allstate Insurance brand to engage in commerce, and may not be protected as “Fair Use.” Example – Brand Abuse
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Brand Erosion Brand Erosion can be a brand killer. It is easy for a disgruntled customer, employee, or deceptive competitor to publish negative experiences with your company’s products and services. Brand Erosion is best prevented by constructing multiple web assets to dominate search engine visibility—this also results in providing visitors multiple brand categories to click-through. In the first Brand Erosion example we take a look at a lawsuit filed by RSA Homes against Google and The Rip Off Report, a consumer advocate website based in Arizona. The New Jersey home builder contends that a posting published on Ripoffreport.com by an angry customer is costing him financially, and is tantamount to cyber-defamation. He is suing Google as a willing accomplice for displaying the web page as the 2nd result for the query “RSA Homes.” The anonymous online posting describes the home builder’s construction work as a “shoddy” nightmare. What Happened? The owner of RSA Homes, Raffi Arslanian, attempted to secure funding for a new development. Three different banks rejected Arslanian after searching Google and finding the prominently displayed Rip Off Report web page in Google. Example I – Brand Erosion
In the second Brand Erosion example below we take a look at Jiffy Lube by searching Google with the keyword phrase “Jiffy Lube.” The second result is a website entitled, “What’s Wrong At Jiffy Lube?,” and features the domain www.jiffylubeproblems.com (trademark infringement?). The fourth result is an investigative video report by NBC news, which finds five out of nine L.A. area Jiffy Lube locations charging the customer without doing any work. The story is cited again in the ninth result, on Snopes.com, and is the first result for “Jiffy Lube” on You Tube (third example). Page 6 of 31 email: brandcommand@ayohwahr.com | website: www.ayohwahr.com
Example II – Brand Erosion
Example III – Brand Erosion
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Brand Dilution Frequently searched companies have got to take control of their brand. Brand Dilution is the weakening of a brand though its overuse. In the search engines, multiple, simultaneous marketing/advertising communiqués, which are inconsistent in message and/or look and feel, flood searches for many prominent brands. In the Brand Dilution example below, we take a look at the Hydroxycut Weight Loss Program by searching Google with the keyword “Hydroxycut.” The strength of this brand is severely diminished by the use of third parties trying to generate ad revenues (commerce) on their “Review” sites, and by resellers/vendors engaged in a price war on the Brand Real Estate of Hydroxycut. The leadership of Hydroxycut would be wise to implement Google’s current trademark policy to halt the use of trademarks in the title and copy of advertisements for Hydroxycut-branded searches. This would allow them to maintain the integrity of their brand, and help clear the way to engage prospects directly. Incidentally, there were 34 advertisements for the keyword search “Hydroxycut” at the time of this research, and none of them appeared to be placed by the brand. Example – Brand Dilution
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Traffic Diversion Traffic Diversion requires the monitoring of branded searches for the purpose of identifying third parties advertising on your trademarks. Traffic Diversion occurs when direct and indirect competitors place ads for your trademarks (company name, products, etc.) on the search engines. These ads dilute your brand and divert traffic away from your web assets. Brand Siphoning is a form of Traffic Diversion that takes place when an affiliate, vendor, or reseller competes with the brand by advertising on branded keywords on the search engines. Common perpetraters trying to divert (steal) traffic for branded searches include eBay, Amazon, several of the shopping aggregators, and faux search engines engaging in search arbitrage. A Cease & Desist letter from your legal department will usually take care of this problem.
Corporate Buzz Corporate Buzz can be positive or negative and impacts how the organization and leadership are perceived. Corporate Buzz may include company news, executives in the media, employee achievements or offenses, corporate policy blunders, and product/service innovations and failures. Bank of America reportedly created controversy by “offering a credit card for illegal immigrants.” The screenshot below cites an example of how the policy to offer this service was scrutinized by thousands of news and blogger sites. . Example I – Corporate Buzz
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The second screenshot illustrates unwanted search engine visibility for Bank of America, which lost secure customer data for 1.2 million federal employees, including some members of the U.S. Senate Example II – Corporate Buzz
Non-compliance Non-compliance can affect brands that have affiliates, independent representatives, distributors, associates, partners, resellers, and vendors promoting their products and services. Non-compliance can affect brands that must follow FDA, FTC, or FCC regulation. Non-compliance can affect Direct Selling and Network Marketing brands. Many organizations are being forced to allocate more resources to address non-compliant web visibility published by contracted affiliates and representatives. In the example below we take a look at XanGo International (a health juice company); specifically, one of several hundreds of news stories reporting FDA intervention for non-compliant advertising claims made by independent distributors.
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Some of the illegal claims reported by the FDA included: •
curing cancer, HIV, and Parkinson’s disease
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lowering blood pressure
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relieving neck, back, and knee pain
Example – Non-compliance
IV.
SEO SEO, or search engine optimization, is the process of optimizing your web pages to rank at the top of natural results in the search engines for targeted keywords. The major search engines include Google, Yahoo, MSN, and Ask.com. Targeted keywords are uncovered utilizing various tools to provide you with comprehensive keyword research. Comprehensive Keyword Research allows you to: •
Drive traffic to your site by optimizing pages for keywords people use when they’re searching.
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Write high-impact website copy by incorporating terms that people immediately identify with.
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Plan profitable paid search campaigns by building up a broad range of keyword phrases that will capture your target market.
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Develop great content ideas that directly address your customers’ needs.
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Understand your target market’s behavior and concerns by analyzing the words that they use.
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Measure the size of a potential online market by the number of searches conducted.
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Develop new revenue streams by using popular keywords to inspire new product and service ideas.
There are two categories of SEO: A. Branded SEO B. Non-branded SEO Branded SEO is the process of optimizing your web pages to rank at the top of natural results in the search engines for frequently searched branded keywords (company name, trademarked product names, etc.) A major premise of Brand Command methodology is to dominate Brand Real Estate on the search engines. So how do you dominate the natural results of branded keyword searches? How do you ensure the majority of first page results on Google are brand assets? In the example below we take a look at Hewlett-Packard by searching Google with the keyword “HP.” Hewlett-Packard and a handful of other brands know that the key to dominate natural results for branded searches is through the use and promotion of sub-domains. Some of the sub-domains Hewlett-Packard utilizes for maximum Brand Real Estate coverage include: welcome.hp.com, hpl.hp.com, shopping.hp.com, grants.hp.com, docs.hp.com, government.hp.com
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Example – Branded SEO
Not only does Hewlett-Packard dominate their precious Brand Real Estate in the natural results of the keyword search, “HP,” but they are providing a better user experience for the searcher. Here is a list of the most frequently searched keywords (phrases) for HP: HP printers HP computers HP inkjet cartridge HP support HP laptop HP ipaq Are the keywords in line with the results in the screenshot above? The second and third examples below illustrate the fact that the major search engines set the rules. They allow multiple subdomain results from the same top-level domain to be visible in any given search, as highlighted in the illustrations. Page 13 of 31 email: brandcommand@ayohwahr.com | website: www.ayohwahr.com
Example II – Branded SEO
Example III – Branded SEO
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Non-branded SEO Non-branded SEO is the process of optimizing your web pages to rank at the top of natural results in the search engines for frequently searched, generic keywords, related to your type of company, products and services, geographic location, etc. While Non-branded SEO is outside the branded search focus of this white paper, I am displaying an example for the purpose of comparison. In this example we look at the non-branded keyword ranking of Discount Tire by searching Google with the generic keyword “tires.” Example – Non-branded SEO
V.
Paid Search (Search Engine Advertising) Paid Search (PPC) is the practice of placing ads on the major search engines for relevant keyword searches. When it comes to Paid Search management for branded searches, there are some high-impact best practices to protect your brand. Every search engine has a unique policy to mitigate Trademark Infringement. For example, Google will allow you to eliminate the ability for third parties to use your trademarks in the title and copy of ads. It is a bureaucratic process, and you will have to submit Page 15 of 31 email: brandcommand@ayohwahr.com | website: www.ayohwahr.com
documentation on your trademarks, but it will generate two major results: A. It will cause many outside advertisers to just stop running ads on your branded searches. B. It will reduce your cost-per-click, sometimes beyond 70% in our experience. Note: There are many brands who have not utilized this option and end up paying $50,000 a month in pay-per-click instead of $30,000. In the first example below we take a look at Paid Search visibility for Mary Kay Cosmetics by searching Google with the keyword phrase “Mary Kay.” By failing to invoke this trademark policy with Google for branded searches, Mary Kay Cosmetics is: 1) Spending more on pay-per-click than they need to 2) Not in control of their brand messaging 3) Vulnerable to non-compliant, confusing, or inaccurate claims by independent representatives Take a look at the Paid Search ads of the screenshot below: “Failing in Mary Kay?” “Low Pay With Mary Kay?” Example – Paid Search
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The leadership of Mary Kay has an opportunity here to take back their precious brand, engage consumers directly, and assign direct retail sales and leads to independent representatives participating in a paid lead program, easily created and managed by corporate, garnering positive ROI. In the next example we take a look at Paid Search visibility for Isagenix International by searching Google with the keyword phrase “Isagenix.” By invoking the trademark policy with Google for branded searches, Isagenix International is: 1) Reducing costs on pay-per-click 2) In control of their brand messaging 3) Ensuring compliance by not allowing their affiliates to compete on the search engines for “branded searches” Example – Paid Search
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But wait—there’s more. Remember, a major premise of Brand Command methodology is to dominate Brand Real Estate on the search engines. So how do you dominate the paid results of branded keyword searches? How do you ensure the majority of first page paid results on Google are brand assets? In the example above, Isagenix International is utilizing their agency to run multiple ads with multiple, trademark-ed domains, on different Adwords accounts. Why would they do this? A. To dominate Brand Real Estate and increase sales and leads B. To provide visibility for multiple types of searche(r)s, accommodating visitors with an enhanced user experience. C. To confront Brand Dilution by third parties trying to divert branded search traffic. D. To reduce their CPC/monthly spend (see below) Note: This strategy is exactly like having multiple affiliates advertising on your trademark, with at least four exceptions: 1. Your brand controls the messaging, calls-to-action, and the consistent (branded) look and feel of the landing pages 2. The URL’s in the ads display your trademark, increasing trust, thereby dominating conversions 3. Because these ads dominate conversions, the Google Quality Score for the ads is high and your cost-per-click is reduced 4. Advertising for many third parties becomes a waste of time and they stop bidding on your trademarks, thereby reducing your monthly ad spend sizably
The ensuing result for Isagenix International is more than economical. •
Isagenix International controls brand messaging by eliminating competing or defamatory ads (they can’t defame you if they can’t use your trademark)
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Isagenix International presents users multiple options and converts a continuous flow of direct sales and leads Page 18 of 31
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Isagenix International no longer has to worry about bad apples from their network of outside distributors advertising false claims or guarantees on the search engines, or communicating confusing messages not in alignment with corporate marketing.
Let’s take another look at Allstate Insurance. In the screenshot below, there are three outside entities attempting to divert branded search traffic. In this example, all three advertisers are independent websites that claim to offer the best-priced policies of the major insurance companies—wrong. Companies like Insureme.com (Insurecom.com in the screenshot) are lead generation sites which sell warm leads to any insurance agent willing to buy them.
Example – Paid Search
Instead of allowing third parties to dominate the Brand Real Estate on Paid Search, doesn’t it make sense to place targeted ads for frequently searched categories of their business? For example: Allstate Car Insurance Find discounts and request a free auto insurance quote. Compare & SAVE! www.allstatecarinsurance.com
Allstate Home Insurance Choose the right insurance coverage to protect you and your assets. www.allstatehomeinsurance.com
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Allstate Agents - Locations FIND an Allstate Insurance Agent in your community. www.allstateinsuranceagents.com
By placing targeted ads Allstate Insurance would accomplish three things: A. Allstate Insurance would dominate their Brand Real Estate B. Allstate Insurance would provide a better user experience by presenting additional, relevant options C. Allstate would dilute the effectiveness of third parties attempting to divert traffic on Allstate-branded searches, and at the same time, generate more business.
VI.
Online PR How can you use the web to spread the word about your brand’s news? How can you leverage search engines to raise awareness? Through strategic development of: A. High-profile Interviews B. Expert Articles, Podcasts, and Webcasts C. White Papers/Case Studies D. Press/News Releases E. Executive and Guru or Expert Blogs F. RSS and Content Distribution G. Social Media H. Virtual Communities Optimize all of this content to rank in the natural results of the search engines, utilize Paid Search campaigns on relevant, branded keywords, and present it in a fashion designed to attract media attention and influence prospects. There are more strategies but one thing is for sure; Good Online PR requires you to persude online journalists and targeted bloggers to engage their audience with your knowledge or information.
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VII. Link Building Link Building is a controversial topic, especially since inbound links to your web assets are the most important factor in ranking your web pages, and Google's Matt Cutts is now actively accepting reports for improper paid link code. There are two types of links: A. Naturally Acquired Links B. Manually Created Links Naturally Acquired Links are generated by virtue of the usefulness of your content, and strength of your brand. The more useful content you publish, the more likely it is that third parties will link to your web assets. Here are some examples of useful content: A. Contact Information/Newsletters/ Company News/Subscriptions B. Product Manuals/Warranty Information/Poduct Specifications C. White Papers/Case Studies/Free Reports D. Online Tools/Programs/Calculators E. Rebates/Free Offers/Coupons/Giveaways/Interactive Contests F. Expert Tips & Advice/Reference Guides/Top Ten Lists/eBooks G. Research/Event Coverage/Interviews Manually Created Links sometimes are considered spam—think of message board signatures, reciprocal links, social media profiles (Squidoo, eSnips, Flickr), social bookmarking sites (del.ici.ous, Blue Dot, Furl), citizen news sites (Newsvine, Huliq) and others. While it is impossible for search engines to judge the intent of these types of links (link spam vs. useful links for your audience), they may de-value or ignore these types of links in their algorithms.
Link Quality The search engines measure the quality of links to your web pages. The overall strength of a link from an outside website to your web page varies based upon multiple factors—here are some: Page 21 of 31 email: brandcommand@ayohwahr.com | website: www.ayohwahr.com
1) The age of the link 2) The thematic relevancy of the page/site the link resides on 3) The quality of the page the link emanates from (is it from an authority site?) 4) The anchor text in the link (the words composing the link) The example below depicts the number of active, inbound links directed at USAToday.com’s web pages from outside websites. Using Yahoo’s Site Explorer tool, we see there are currently 7,329,694 incoming links. Example – Link Building
VIII. Business Development To Brand Loyalty The driver for capturing direct sales and targeted leads online is through search engines and content distribution. Dominate your Brand Real Estate and design high-converting Landing Pages, utilizing order forms, lead generation forms, and subscription forms. Generally speaking, the more data you require on a lead form, the more serious the inquiry will be. We find that
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some Asian societies will fill out forms en masse out of simple curiosity. Create and distribute press releases, articles, white papers, ebooks, blog postings, social media profiles, and audio and video podcasts to procure visibility. Use Pull Marketing strategies to convert leads and subscriptions. One example of Pull Marketing would be to offer proprietary collateral, such as an informative “White Paper,” in exchange for contact information. Below is an excellent example of Pull Marketing featuring Jillian Michaels from NBC’s hit series “The Biggest Loser” and her weight loss program. Example – Pull Marketing/Landing Page
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The Brand Relationship A Brand Relationship must convey certain characteristics such as trust, dependability, passion, caring, and respect. The web and email have significantly expanded the capacity for companies to nurture Brand Relationships with the access to, and delivery of, newsletters, alerts, recipes, promotions, exclusive product releases, coupons, free updates, catalogs, customer service, and much more.
Brand Loyalty Brand Loyalty is the crown jewel achievement of marketing. Brand Loyalty occurs when clients or customers of a brand are committed to repurchasing or recommending the brand to others. Powerful product reviews such as the example below have left American consumers with the following brand perception: While Sony TV’s are usually the most expensive, the premium picture quality is worth the investment. Example – Brand Loyalty
Visibility of Brand Loyalty influences prospects and spikes sales. Page 24 of 31 email: brandcommand@ayohwahr.com | website: www.ayohwahr.com
Brand Loyalty allows a company to focus on business retention rather than business development. Brand Loyalty online can appear in many forms: impromptu celebrity endorsements in the news, extraordinary product review submissions on the shopping aggregators, raving testimonials on message boards, or rousing ovations on blogs. So what do you do with instances of Brand Loyalty? When appropriate, highlight them in press releases, promote them on blogs, and reward! Loyalty Reward programs are popping up everywhere and loyal customers appreciate them.
IX.
Web Analytics Everything online can be measured! Web Analytics is a program that collects data about the activities of people accessing your website. Analytic data provides the details of how they found you, when they visited, what pages they looked at, what they bought or downloaded, and much more. How should marketing practitioners determine what to measure? Your ability to mine Actionable Data is crucial to your business operation and can make a profound difference on your bottom line—particularly if you generate a lot of traffic online or your web assets play a significant role in business development.
Example – Google Analytics Screenshot
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X.
Integrating Online Marketing In The May 2007 issue of Glamour Magazine, 38% (50 of 133) of the advertisements presented an online call to action and 74% (99 of 133) referenced a web address. Simple commands, such as “Visit” or “Shop,” accounted for 20% (10 of 50) of the calls-to-action online. While the percentage of print advertisers referencing a web address has climbed since 2000, the number of ads prominently presenting a well thought out call-to-action online is suprisingly scant. Creating Microsites, or “Search Commercials,” is inexpensive, dynamic, and measurable. If you are a corporate practitioner you may be thinking, “Inexpensive? Are you serious?” My contention is based on the premise that you are not being mugged by your agency, or that you have an in-house creative team to support the development of online assets. The real opportunity here is to create a Brand Relationship, and ultimately, Brand Loyalty, by expanding the initial offline communique online, and truly engaging the targeted prospect. What’s the best feature of the internet? It’s always on! Working for you 24/7 to create satisfying user experiences and build your brand. Below are five advertisers from the May 2007 issue of Glamour that stood out for their Pull Marketing strategies designed to direct prospects to web assets: 1. Always ~ “Go to Always.com for a free sample while supplies last” 2. Caress ~ “Free samples and enter for a chance to win” 3. Jewelry.com ~ “May is Gold Month. Enter to win your favorite gold jewelry” 4. Imitrex ~ “Save up to $25 on your next refill of Imitrex” 5. L’Oreal ~ “Log on to get application tips and tricks”
The most interactive campaign stemming from the May 2007 issue of Glamour is Caress Fairy Tales, a two-page spread for Caress Exotic Oil Infusions, Cream Oil Body Wash. This fantasy escape theme plays out in the form of a romantic, mysterious movie preview, entitled “Modern-Day Fairytales.” The Page 26 of 31 email: brandcommand@ayohwahr.com | website: www.ayohwahr.com
creative is warm, lush, dreamy, and playful, down to the shape and colors of the product packaging. The call-to-action is prominently placed in the middle of the left page, then repeated in the footer.
Watch the fairytales hosted by Kate Walsh at
caressfairytales.com The offer: “Free samples and enter for a chance to win exotic prizes at caressfairytales.com”
Playing on a laptop near you. Upon arriving at the microsite, www.caressfairytales.com, visitors are greeted by host Kate Walsh in a short welcome video expanding the offline messaging. The video fades and renders a new look and feel in the screenshot below: Example I – Integrating Offline and Online Marketing
An additional interactive element allows visitors to “Create Your Own Prince Charming” or “Star In Your Own Fairy Tale.”
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The three business related calls-to-action are, 1) Enter For A Chance To Win, 2) Free Samples, and, 3) Tell a friend. The selections prompt nicely designed registration forms which capture demographic and contact data. Did Caress support this campaign with paid search ads for “Caress Fairy Tales?” Yes, they nailed it right down to the ad copy, “Unleash Your Mysterious Side And Win A Trip To Japan Or Morocco.” Travel, romance, mystery—is that alluring? While the campaign didn’t produce an adgasm for the elites at Adrants, it is an excellent example of engaging targeted prospects for a seamingly featureless product, and developing the mighty, mighty Brand Relationship. One advertiser that I felt missed an opportunity was Crunch Fitness and their “Beach Body Bootcamp” campaign. Crunch advertised a “Complimentary Fitness Class and Giveaways,” citing ten cities and dates. There was no reference to a website. The ad did not feature an online call-to-action, such as “RSVP Online, Space Is Limited!,” “Take A Peak At The Most Innovative Fitness Classes Available Including Cardio Striptease And Kama Sutra Yoga,” or “Can’t Make This Date? Visit Online For Special Events and Free Fitness Tips.” Crunch Fitness truly is a unique fitness experience and I love the creative employed on their website–check it out at www.crunch.com.
The beautiful thing about the internet is, It’s always on! On a weekly basis I research products and services I am interested in by using search engines. Often times my interest is triggered by offline marketing and advertising campaigns—TV, radio, print, billboards, buses, taxis, even bathroom stall signage. Another opportunity for business-to-consumer companies is to invest in sponsorships and cross-promotions with organizations or events that exude stature and a loyal following. In this endeavor, it is critical for the brand to establish a clear link to an event or organization. Note: the presence of a competing brand may significantly dilute your opportunity. The screenshot below displays my recent experience at a NASCAR Racing event in Phoenix. DIRECTV and ESPN partnered with NASCAR to provide an interactive attraction designed to generate new business and create a Brand Relationship. Page 28 of 31 email: brandcommand@ayohwahr.com | website: www.ayohwahr.com
DIRECTV is a racing team sponsor and ESPN a new media partner for 2007. Fans are invited to receive free photos in different scenarios—in Victory Lane, at the ESPN Sports Desk (below), etc. After the picture is taken, an attraction staffer provides the visitor with a business card that features a heavily branded website where the visitor can download, share, and send the photos in exchange for name, age, zip code, and email info. There is much ROI to be had by implementing interactive campaigns that require visitors to register their profile and contact info. This delivers Marketing a database to increase mindshare with touchpoints to targeted consumers. Example II – Integrating Offline and Online Marketing
The bottom line is this: if you can influence a targeted prospect to come to your website with offline messaging, it is likely you will convert a sale or lead, and establish a precious Brand Relationship. Note: I switched to DIRECTV and the sports package upgrade (including multiple ESPN channels) three weeks later. I can’t imagine going back to Cox cable with their current offering. If you are simply going to place a website address on an offline campaign, don’t just use the home page. Create a sub-domain specifically for that campaign that is easy to remember and uses a keyword associated with the campaign. The online messaging should be an extension of the offline advertisement, and designed to convert additional actions.
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XI.
Join Us! Brand Command is all about protecting your carefully nurtured brand online and dominating your Brand Real Estate on the search engines. It’s that simple. If you are a corporate leader or brand marketing practitioner, and have specific questions about the material covered, please contact me directly at (480) 570-9694.
We invite corporate marketing practitioners and experienced agencies, consultants, and vendors to join us in the development of our “Brand Command” book, slated for publication this fall. This section of the expanded hard copy edition will be dedicated to real-life experiences, successes, and lessons learned, related to Brand Protection Online, SEO, Paid Search, Online PR, Business Development, Pull Marketing, Analytics, and Integrating Online Marketing Initiatives. Your contributions may be subject to editing, and every source will be credited, unless otherwise agreed to. To submit your experiences, visit: http://brandcommand.ayohwahr.com/brand-commandbook.htm
Thank you for your interest in our “Brand Command” methodology and your desire to leverage the power of your brand online! Tom
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To be in command of your brand, contact us for an initial consultation. In addition to our standard agency services, we also specialize in training in-house staff the core competencies presented. We are very passionate about this industry and stay current on the latest techniques, trends, and news. Thank you for the opportunity to share our methodology. Please send any questions or comments to: brandcommand@ayohwahr.com
General Contact Information: Phone: 480.228.8984 Email: contact@ayohwahr.com Web: www.ayohwahr.com Blog: www.semreportcard.com
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